


through his lips and through his tongue

by Acai



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Angst, Childhood Trauma, Comfort, Emotional Hurt, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Flashbacks, Hurt Andrew Minyard, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, M/M, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Panic Attacks, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Relapse, andrew watches the history channel and he hates every second of it, neil is supportive and careful
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-28
Updated: 2019-01-28
Packaged: 2019-10-18 02:18:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,645
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17572424
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Acai/pseuds/Acai
Summary: When Andrew had been younger, he’d wanted to demand a reason for everything. Angry and bitter and wanting some sort of explanation, some sort of why?He was old enough now to know that there wasn’t one. It was something he’d picked apart with Bee, grasping at straws to try and find something. She always let him grasp, always let him tense up and spill out the maybe’s until he wore himself out enough to stop ranting and numb up.





	through his lips and through his tongue

**Author's Note:**

> warnings:   
> \- trauma from csa   
> \- non-descriptive flashbacks  
> \- a brief suicidal thought
> 
> this is a little heavy, so be sure nothing mentioned above or in the tags is triggering to you before proceeding. <3

Andrew woke up to an itch that he hadn’t missed. 

It had been touch and go, lately. Bee had called it a  _ dip, _ rather than a relapse, but they had both known what she meant. 

It was weird to think of it as a relapse, which insinuated that he had made some kind of progress or was doing well beforehand. But, logically, he knew that he had. Two years ago he would have spent a day like today holed up somewhere trying to shake off the feeling in some other way. Two years ago, he probably would have just given in to the itch and then kicked at a wall until Nicky told him to stop, and then he would have kicked harder. 

It had been sort of desperate, then. Swamping him and swallowing him whole. Something raw and living trying to crawl up, up, up out of him and tear him up. Now it was only tiring. He woke up feeling heavy and foggy and tired, and his first thought was,  _ can’t I catch a break?  _

Neil was asleep next to him, which was comforting usually. Today it made Andrew slip out of bed and to the bathroom, clicking the door shut behind him and shucking his shirt off when it felt too tight against his skin. He slid down the wall, catching his face in his hands when he reached the floor. 

Andrew rubbed at his eyes, feeling too tired and too weary and old and young at the same time. 

_ Can’t I catch a fucking break?  _ He thought again. 

When Andrew had been younger, he’d wanted to demand a reason for everything. Angry and bitter and wanting some sort of  _ explanation,  _ some sort of  _ why?  _

He was old enough now to know that there wasn’t one. It was something he’d picked apart with Bee, more than once, grasping at straws to try and find something. That childish desperation like an apparition, hovering slightly to his left. She always let him grasp, always let him tense up and spill out the  _ maybe’s _ until he wore himself out enough to stop ranting and numb up. 

He wanted to talk to Bee. He didn’t. 

Andrew stayed where he was, head in his hands on the floor, long enough to hear the life starting to stir awake around the dorms. A part of him was stubborn enough to wait another stretch of minutes before hauling himself to his feet. When he peeled his eyes open, the face that stared back at him in the mirror was older and more weary than the one looping in his head. 

He wanted to break the glass. He didn’t. 

He tugged his shirt back on and left the bathroom. 

Kevin was sprawled unceremoniously across the couch in the living room, lanky enough that his feet spill over the armrest. Neil was at the table, still waking up as he scrolled through his phone. He glanced up at Andrew for a moment, eyes scouring him and lingering on his face just long enough for Andrew’s skin to crawl before he turned back to his phone screen. 

When had Andrew become so easy to read? 

Instead of taking a spot at the table, he disappeared back into their room. There was a loop in his head, a knot in his gut. It’s out of control and overwhelming, and Andrew decides that he hates it. If this feeling were a person, Andrew would beat the shit out of it. 

It wasn’t a person, though, so instead he found himself flat on his back on the floor, palms pressed into his eyelids. The pressure sent white dots flitting across his eyelids, but he didn’t lighten up. There was a pressure in his chest, too, swelling up, and it was impossible to tell whether he was going to throw up or punch something. 

The bedroom door clicked open, and Andrew picked  _ punch something.  _

His fist connected with the wall in the amount of time it took for Neil to shut the door behind him again. The tremble that lingered in his hand was from the punch, Andrew decided, and nothing else. 

He remembered, faintly, how it felt to react with an exhausted sort of sadness when he’d been young, much younger, clutching at bedspreads and crying.

It was all that it took for the knot in his stomach to turn into anger churning up and spilling over. 

“Andrew,” Neil said, and all of the anger seeped out onto the carpet and left Andrew to limply roll onto his back plant his palms over his eyes once more. 

Was he angry, was he not? 

How long had it been since he’d cried over this? A decade? He tried, halfheartedly, to summon up the emotion, but his gut didn’t even twist. Too bad. 

Neil had taken a seat on the floor across the room at some point. Andrew didn’t particularly care when. 

He wanted Neil to leave. He wanted Neil to come closer. He wanted Neil to  _ go  _ and not come  _ back. _ He wanted Neil  _ right here  _ and  _ right now. _

They sat in silence for what could have been minutes or could have been years. 

Bee would tell him to do something else, to not just lay down and absorb it. Maybe he hated Bee. Maybe he hated Neil. Maybe he’d drop out of college or drop off the roof. 

Neil stood up and slipped out of the room. 

With more stubborn fervor than before, Andrew punched the wall once more for good measure. The biting ache in his hand was satisfying for a couple of moments. 

His head swallowed itself up in the feeling again, lingering on exhausted fear and what it felt like to be  _ small  _ and unable to  _ do  _ anything. It lingered on a numb,  _ how is this fucking fair?  _ and a bitter  _ is this all there fucking is?  _ and a desperate  _ it is never going to go away.  _

There was a memory looping, of being twelve and giving up, just letting it happen. He was really just getting into the good part when Neil made a reappearance. 

“Kevin’s at practice,” he said, and he didn’t move from where he was lingering in the doorway. Andrew didn’t comment for long enough that Neil continued without a response. “You’ll feel better on the couch than you will on the floor.” 

Andrew met the suggestion with silence, not feeling up to doing anything about it. 

“Go to the couch or I’ll call Bee,” Neil finally said, and it would have read like a threat from anyone else. From Neil, it’s a compromise. He won’t relent and let Andrew soak in it on the ground. Either he’ll mope on the couch or he’ll mope to Bee. 

Talking to Bee, or anybody, right then sounded pointless and exhausting. He didn’t have anything to say to anyone, and he decidedly hated them all enough that he’d indubiously tear apart anyone who got within arms reach. 

Andrew hauled himself to his feet, leaning on the wall unsteadily until Neil disappeared again. 

The couch has a blanket folded neatly on one corner. The TV’s on, with the remote placed on the coffee table. There’s a glass of water in between the remote and a piece of cinnamon toast. 

Neil had disappeared to the bathroom to get ready, allowing Andrew to take or leave the setup. 

He took it. 

The TV was turned on to a documentary. Undoubtedly, Kevin had turned it to this channel that morning. Andrew didn’t care even a little bit about America in the seventeenth century, but he cared even less for the thought of reaching for the remote and changing the channel. 

From there began a cycle. For a few minutes, he’d be too tired and overloaded to think about everything clogging up his head, and he’d focus on the television instead. Then he’d cycle back into the thoughts, tense and disgusting memories, until he’d worn himself out into watching a history documentary again. 

It took Neil seven, eight cycles of it to finish getting ready. 

By the time Andrew reached ten and Neil still hadn’t moved, the knot in his chest had faded at least enough for him to stop bubbling up with anger every time he looked over and found him still there. 

Feeling heavy, he said, “come here,” and Neil was there like it was just that easy. 

Andrew pointed a finger tiredly to the other half of the couch, and Neil assumed a position there, careful not to cross the seam of his cushion into Andrew’s space. 

“I,” Andrew announced dryly. “Fucking hate this.” 

Neil didn’t answer, and Andrew didn’t want him to. 

They watched the history channel until Neil finally had mercy and changed the channel. Andrew cycled in and out of the past and the present, and Neil sat next to him while he did. It wasn’t a panacea, but it was better than it had been in the morning. 

Tomorrow, Andrew figured, he would go to Bee instead of morning practice. Two birds with one stone. He would refuse to tell Kevin that he’d watched at least three history channel documentaries, because Kevin would probably have a stroke with joy. 

It would happen again, eventually. Andrew doubted it would ever stop happening. And it would never stop being fucking terrible. 

Except that it would be  _ alright, _ eventually. At some point,  _ eventually,  _ it would trickle off and he would feel at least a little better, and then he’d go in and sort through some of the thick feelings. That was more than he had to cling onto before. 

He’d go to bed on his own, tonight, but maybe the next day or the day after that he’d plant himself next to Neil the way that he always did. It would fucking suck until then, and still after, but he’d survive it. 

**Author's Note:**

> thank you all for reading, let me know what you thought below! 
> 
> follow me for more like this or to talk headcanons!   
> Tumblr: 12am   
> Pillowfort: Vine   
> Twitter: Touyata  
> Discord: fool#2109


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